Novice cooks, meet your messiah

After suffering through a year of ‘res’ food at university, Hein Scholtz was more than happy to dust off his apron and put his lifelong passion for food and cooking to good use when he moved into his first apartment. Now, after years of cooking healthy and inexpensive, yet satisfying meals for himself and friends, he presents ‘Munch’, an eclectic collection of recipes for students, young professionals and first-time cooks.

Although it contains some classic “home” cooking (I liked the sound of that; he remembers some of the yummy mummy recipes – nice one, Hein), Munch’s primary aim is to introduce the novice cook to an

independent style of cooking that will have him/her producing meals that not only appeal to the palate (and the pocket), but also to the inner grown-up with the desire to impress.
There are 76 recipes in the book and they range from scrambling eggs and cooking chicken to grilling steaks and recreating classic ‘takeaways’.
Hein has a degree in nutrition from Stellenbosch University, as well as an honours degree in media and journalism.

While at varsity, he shared his culinary experience .Hein was contacted by Dr Michael Mol to help produce his new SABC3 programme ‘The Dr Mol Show’. Hein works as a senior producer for the show, producing both studio and location-based segments and working closely with presenters and sponsors to give a holistic view of health and wellness in South Africa.

The book starts off with the chapter ‘Initiation’ and then moves on to such chapters as ‘The Starter Kitchen’, ‘7 Ways with Eggs & some other brekkie ideas’, ‘Light Meals & some accomplished accompaniments’, ‘Taking on the Takeaway with wraps, pizzas, burgers & pies’, ‘Don’t be Chicken – cook chicken!’ and ‘Catch of the Day & some other fishy bites’.

So let’s do some cooking straight from Hein’s book!

Makes 24

Ingredients:

250g cooked pumpkin or butternut

1 heaped tbsp. butter

1 kg all-purpose flour

10g instant dried yeast

70g brown, caramel, treacle or Demerara sugar (the darker, the more flavour)